狄更斯雙語小說:《董貝父子》第25章Part 5

Free from debt, and with no fear for his personal liberty, or the seizure of his goods, what else but such a state of madness could have hurried him away alone and secretly? As to his carrying some apparel with him, if he had really done so - and they were not even sure of that - he might have done so, the Captain argued, to prevent inquiry, to distract attention from his probable fate, or to ease the very mind that was now revolving all these possibilities. Such, reduced into plain language, and condensed within a small compass, was the final result and substance of Captain Cuttle's deliberations: which took a long time to arrive at this pass, and were, like some more public deliberations, very discursive and disorderly.
Dejected and despondent in the extreme, Captain Cuttle felt it just to release Rob from the arrest in which he had placed him, and to enlarge him, subject to a kind of honourable inspection which he still resolved to exercise; and having hired a man, from Brogley the Broker, to sit in the shop during their absence, the Captain, taking Rob with him, issued forth upon a dismal quest after the mortal remains of Solomon Gills.
Not a station-house, or bone-house, or work-house in the metropolis escaped a visitation from the hard glazed hat. Along the wharves, among the shipping on the bank-side, up the river, down the river, here, there, everywhere, it went gleaming where men were thickest, like the hero's helmet in an epic battle. For a whole week the Captain read of all the found and missing people in all the newspapers and handbills, and went forth on expeditions at all hours of the day to identify Solomon Gills, in poor little ship-boys who had fallen overboard, and in tall foreigners with dark beards who had taken poison - 'to make sure,' Captain Cuttle said, 'that it wam't him.' It is a sure thing that it never was, and that the good Captain had no other satisfaction.
Captain Cuttle at last abandoned these attempts as hopeless, and set himself to consider what was to be done next. After several new perusals of his poor friend's letter, he considered that the maintenance of' a home in the old place for Walter' was the primary duty imposed upon him. Therefore, the Captain's decision was, that he would keep house on the premises of Solomon Gills himself, and would go into the instrument-business, and see what came of it.

他已經沒有債務，不用害怕失去個人自由或沒收他的財物，除了這種精神失常的狀態之外，還有什麼別的原因使他孑然一身，急急忙忙地、偷偷摸摸地從家裏跑出去呢？至於他如果真的帶走一些物品的話——他們甚至對這一點也還不是很肯定的——，那麼，船長判斷，他這樣做可能是爲了防止對他進行調查追究，轉移對他可能死亡的疑慮或者是爲了使那些現在正在反覆琢磨着所有這些可能性的人們放心。如果用明白的語言和簡潔的形式敘述出來的話，那麼卡特爾船長思考的最後結果和主要內容就是這樣一些。卡特爾船長是經過很長時間的思考纔得到這個結論的；就像其他一些比較公開的思考一樣，它們是很散漫、很混亂的。
卡特爾船長垂頭喪氣、灰心失望到了極點；他曾經使羅布處於被逮捕狀態，他覺得現在應當解除他的這種狀態，並在對他進行體面的監督（這是他決定仍要進行的）之後，把他釋放。船長從經紀人布羅格利那裏僱來了一個人在他們外出期間看守店鋪，然後就帶着羅布一道出發，憂心忡忡地去尋找所羅門·吉爾斯的遺骸。
在這個都城中，沒有一個派出所，沒有一處無名屍體招領處，沒有一個救貧院，那頂上了光的硬帽子不曾前去訪問過。在碼頭上，在岸邊的船的中間，在河流的上游，在河流的下游，這裏，那裏，每一個地點，它都像史詩描寫的戰役中的英雄的鋼盔一般，在人羣稠密的地方閃耀着亮光。船長整個星期念着所有報紙和傳單中找到人和丟失人的消息，一天中的每個小時都走着遠路，去把那些掉進水裏的可憐的年輕的見習船員、那些服毒自殺的、長着黑鬍子、身材高大的外國人仔細辨認，究竟是不是所羅門·吉爾斯。“查查確實，”卡特爾船長說，“那不是他。”這倒是千真萬確，並不是他，善良的船長得不到其他安慰。
卡特爾船長終於放棄了這些毫無希望的嘗試，考慮他下一步該做什麼。他把他可憐的朋友的信重新細讀了幾次之後認爲，“在老地方爲沃爾特保留一個家”，這是託付給他的主要責任。因此，船長決定移居到所羅門·吉爾斯家中，經營儀器生意，看看這樣做有什麼結果。